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Finally, he comes.  He grins, drops of perspiration slide from his forehead and splash onto her face.  She licks them away.  Simon rolls onto the other side of the bed, still grinning.  Jill thinks he probably doesn’t get laid that often.  He might even have been a virgin.  She looks at him again.  Yes. That’s it, she thinks.  When she sits up, his come dribbles out onto the curry-stained bed sheet.  She supposes she should have insisted he use a condom.  But she’s a rebel, isn’t she?

Above the bed is a James Dean poster, that pose he’s so famous for, glancing over his shoulder, wearing the familiar red leather jacket.  Jill thought no one was into James Dean anymore.  In the eighties, when she was a teenager, his face was on calendars and posters and T-shirts.  An icon, they called him.  Jill was a fan.  Saw herself as a bit like him.  A rebel without a cause.  Still sees herself like that, if she’s honest.  Doesn’t matter she is twice-divorced with a four year old daughter.

Now that they’ve done it, Simon doesn’t want her to hang around.  He doesn’t say as much, but he hints he has a very early start and he wouldn’t want to disturb her.  A politics lecture.   Bullshit, of course.  Jill’s never been a student but everyone knows they don’t get up early for anything.  They’re like dolies.  Jill assumes he doesn’t want his friends to meet her.  She has to get back anyway, there’s Marion, the babysitter, to pay.  So she uses the cracked sink in the corner of the room to splash cold water on her face and between her legs and she pulls on her clothes, which stink of The Ritzy where she picked Simon up. 

While she’s waiting for her bus, Jill thinks to herself that her problem has always been she’s wanted what she can’t have.  When she was a teenager, she wanted to be married, she wanted a job and a mortgage.  Now she’s got responsibilities, all she wants is to shrug them off.  She envies the students: new to the city, new to the life, they think they’re so daring getting pissed on watered-down lager at the nightclubs they hang out in.  She goes to the same clubs, hoping she looks a few years younger than she actually is, waiting for them to approach her.  They want one thing.  It’s not like they’re going to consider a relationship with someone her age. And while she’s letting them do their stuff, groping hands uncertain, (because what do they know about sex at that age?) Jill is gorging herself on memories of her own lost youth.

 

Marion is asleep on the sofa when Jill gets in.  The telly flickers in a corner of the room, volume turned down to a mumble.  Jill shakes Marion by the shoulder.

“Jesus, is that the time?” Marion mutters, reaching for her coat.  She has slippers on, always does, as she only lives three doors down.  Wears slippers here even when it’s raining.  Jill can’t remember seeing Marion in shoes when she comes to think about it.

“Was Carly good?” she asks, opening the door.

“An angel.”  The way Marion says it makes Jill feel guilty.  She fumbles about in her purse and pulls out a tenner.  Marion smoothes it against her thigh, then folds it in half and sticks it in her skirt pocket.  Practical, Marion is.  She has pockets sewn onto all of her clothes.

“Darren’s got a friend he’d like you to meet,” Marion says, one slippered foot in the house, one on the pavement. 

“I’m not really into blind dates.” 

Icy air is filling the living room.  Jill wishes Marion would just leave.  But she’s stubborn, Marion is.  “What about Carly?  How d’you think she feels growing up without a man around the place?”

Jill shrugs, attempts to close the door.  But Marion isn’t shifting.  Not yet.  “I’ll be in touch – he’s a nice man, Trevor is.  Suitable.”

 Both Marion’s feet are on the pavement now.  Before she can say anything else Jill has slammed the door. 

She checks on Carly before going to bed.  The little girl is curled up in a tight ball, her pink gingham duvet pushed aside.  Jill covers her daughter with the duvet, kisses her forehead.  Carly whispers something in her sleep.  Jill sighs, watching her daughter for a few minutes.

  

A pub lunch at dinner time.  Two steak and kidney pies, chips and peas.  Jill has never heard of anyone eating a pub lunch at dinner time. She hates steak and kidney.  Not even sure why she ordered it, now it’s sitting on a plate in front of her.  She lifts the pastry top off the pie.  Underneath, the meat looks like something served from a tin in a dog food commercial.  Or a pile of dog shit, depending on your point of view.

“Lovely place this,” the man, Trevor, says.  He’s a bit like a dog himself; friendly face, eyes unsure but eager.  A Labrador.  Jill finds she likes him, despite herself.  “Steak and kidney is the best in this part of the country.”

“It’s delicious,” Jill says.

“But you’ve hardly touched yours,” Trevor frowns, face full of concern, as if she’s a starving waif in India.

“You know us ladies – like to watch our weight,” Jill explains.

Trevor nods, pleased.  He is probably wondering what she is wearing underneath the lacy purple dress. 

After they have eaten, Trevor suggests they go for a drive.  Jill nods, almost enthusiastic, remembering this was the kind of thing she did when she was seventeen: cruising in some bloke’s car, five or six of them squashed together.  Then stopping somewhere, pairing off for a snog and a feel.  The lads didn’t expect or want more.  Now they always do.  Maybe it’s a signal she gives off.  Maybe it’s just a part of growing-up.  Getting old.

Trevor helps her on with her coat.  She buttons it up, wanting to keep herself covered.  Trevor smiles and takes her hand.  There is pastry crumbs around his mouth. Without really thinking what she is doing she reaches up and brushes them away with her hand.

 

Jill stands at the bar with a glass of Baileys and ice.  She’s wearing a tight-fitting black dress, which Trevor likes.  He says she looks right in something short and slinky.  The students are untidy in their dirty jeans and Doc Martin boots, shaggy hair falling into their eyes.  And they don’t know how to dance properly.  Jill hums a few bars of ‘Lady in Red’ to herself.  She was one of the white stiletto and perm brigade in the eighties.  Wasn’t into students then, preferred lads like herself who had failed their O’Levels and started work.     

“Can I get you a beer?”  At first she doesn’t hear him.  The music drowns him out.  The student mimes drinking from an empty glass on a nearby table. 

“Yeah,” says Jill, smiling.  “Yeah.  Why not?” 

“Great,” says the student, causal though, as if he knew she’d agree.

 

Six months.  Trevor says he has something to ask her.  Jill knows what it is.  Marion’s been hinting for ages.  Jill keeps trying to put the moment off.  Hold him back, like he’s an out-of-control car about to crash into her. But she can’t get out of the way.  She’s transfixed by the headlights.  They’ve been to the pictures and are finishing up with pizza.  Jill picks at her food as usual.  Trevor has taken her out to a few expensive restaurants, but as the size of her appetite became obvious, he stuck to pubs and pizza parlours like this one.  When the waiter whisks their plates away, Trevor takes a small black box out of his pocket and places it on the table.  Jill wishes he had chosen somewhere more private.  She feels the waiters staring at her, eyes boring through her freshly-washed hair into her skull.  Into her thoughts.  She opens the box.  The ring is gold with a diamond in the centre.  Pretty, but not spectacular.  Her body feels too warm, as if she’s sitting in a hot bath.  Her armpits itch from when she shaved them earlier.

“I don’t know what to say.”

“Say yes.”  He still reminds her of a Labrador; if he had a tail he’d be wagging it now.

  Another husband.  Tea at half-past five, his suits in her wardrobe, his programmes on the telly, his aftershave in the bathroom cabinet.  Is this what she wants? 

“I don’t know.”  She can’t look at him.  She imagines his crest-fallen face.

“Why?  You know I love you…and Carly.  I’d do anything for the two of you.”

“I know.”

“Then why won’t you?”

“I’m not ready.” She feels exhausted by his kindness.

“Take it anyway.” His voice is thick with disappointment.   He closes the lid on the box and pushes it towards her.

“I can’t take it.”

“Yes you can. All I want is for you to think about what I’ve said.”

Trevor reaches out and squeezes her hands. Maybe she’d feel differently if he looked like James Dean.

 

Jill has ordered a bottle of champagne and is about a third of the way through it.  The bar man told her it wasn’t the done thing to drink champagne alone.  So what does he know? After a while, a student approaches.  He’s been looking at her for a while from the other end of the bar.

“What are you celebrating?”  He glances quickly at her breasts in their Wonderbra.

“I’m getting married next week.  This is my hen night.”  The student has to lean close to catch her words. 

“Where are your mates?” he asks eventually.

  Jill shrugs.  “I like my own company.”

He smiles, reassured.  She hadn’t meant to pick anyone up.  Not tonight.  She just needed a bit of time alone. She wishes she was in one of those eighties revival clubs, dancing to Spandau Ballet and Duran Duran.  The eighties were bursting with opportunity.  Everyone said so. 

“So you’re still a free agent until next week?” The student moves close.  Jill imagines she’s seventeen again, but beautiful this time, a Hollywood starlet. And James Dean is standing beside her. He’s going to be kissing her in a minute, losing control, as if he’s driving too fast.

“Yeah, that’s right,” Jill says, imaging herself in a car with him, a silver sports car,  “I don’t belong to anyone.”